I have mentioned, too, about wanting notifications if someone replies to a post that I also replied to since only the main poster gets notices. How can you tell there are a ton of new members? Guess, that's something I haven't found yet. On the old DS it was easy to click on new members to see who had signed on but haven't found that here?

I believe it says they are working on that for the next release.

I can only tell because of all the new posts coming from new users. You are right - there doesn't seem to be a good way to see who is new.

I have also suggested that there be a way to follow a thread (the old ds "watch this") and that we are alerted when someone comments on their journal LIKE THEY USED TO DO and that we get email alerts to that effect.

As for ds getting a ton of new members, IDK. The traffic on this site is way down; as is users' satisfaction, at least according to this site.
http://www.easycounter.com/report/dailystrength.org
Their (ds) reputation is 60% negative & 40% positive. And traffic from social media is only 2.7%, mostly from stumbleupon.com. If you check out ds on facebook, you'll see very little in the way of comments or even likes for what they post.

Page views have dropped from 110K in March (old ds) to 47k in August (new ds). That's a pretty darn big drop. And much of the traffic comes equally from India and the US (at 36% each).

And frankly I don't want to be tagged. I don't like it on fb and I don't think it belongs here UNLESS and ONLY IF the tagee has complete control as to whether being tagged goes public. IMHO, tagging interferes with member privacy.

I have only been on DS a short time - I wasn't a member for the older version, so I don't know. I'm just saying that there seems to be a majority of the postings coming from new users. I'm sure the dissatisfaction is causing many of them to leave though.

Yeah maybe tagging isn't the answer, but the capability to follow a thread would be nice.

Lots of good suggestions have come from both new and older DS members :) If they could have these things where we can check to use them or not then everyone would be happy :) I don't like getting notifications in my emails but for those that do, it's good to have it where someone can check to have notifications sent to email or not. I do love getting the notifications here at the site :)

"If they could have these things where we can check to use them or not then everyone would be happy :)"

I totally agree CountryGal! They actually USED to have email alert options (altho that broke from many of us where we got zip regardless of what we had chosen). They also USED to have options as to who saw our activity (everyone, friends only and only me). But they've pretty much gutted the site when it comes to choices and easily found info.

uagyrl, Re: new members: Is there something I'm not aware of that says how long one has been a member? We USED to have join dates on our profiles that were easily seen, but that's gone too.

DS used to have a function where you could follow a post; that meant getting an email everytime that post was replied to.

Now we sort of get "automatic following" for the posts we make. Which is nice, I will admit.

I do get a lot of stuff in my activity feed when friends do things, so friending people is a bit like tagging them. Sort of. Guess that is OK with me.

I do agree, it would be nice to have more control over what notifications we do and do not get.

the "new updated ds" puts us automatically on facebook? since when? does anyone know that this is fact? please, please let me know; thanks

I continue to get e mails stating that someone has hugged me, messaged me, or read my journal. That was how it was with the old DS so maybe that is why I continue to get notifications. What I have trouble with is when I go to "notifications" and it says so and so has replied to my post but doesn't say which post. Hopefully that will change as well. Hang in there. I started here in 2009 and hated it when the format changed, but anything good takes time to get use to. I also wish they would make this area where I can read it so I can find my typing mistakes! LOL